The First European Education Summit: focus on inclusion and common values

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The first European Education Summit was held in Brussels on 25 January. The European Commission invited EU education ministers, education practitioners, stakeholders and business leaders to explore:

  • how to better address inequality in education systems
  • how citizens can benefit from a future European Education Area
  • how education can help transmit our common values
  • what competences will be needed for the decades to come

The opening 

keynote speech was held by Samatha Cristoforetti who talked about the transformative learning experience of her year abroad with AFS. The President of the European Youth Forum, Luis Alvarado Martinez, underlined the role of organisations such as EFIL is bridging between formal and non-formal education.samatha

Samatha Cristoforetti_Photo credit: European Commission

AFS values are high in the educational agenda of the EU. In this light, just before the Summit, the European Commission released the ‘Future of  Learning’ package, namely the proposals for two EU Council recommendations of utmost importance for our field, which will be adopted on the 22nd of May:

–       the recommendation on the revised key competence framework where common values, intercultural learning and civic education will play an important role

–       the recommendation on EU common values

EFIL has contributed with position papers to the public consultation on both policy documents. Here you can read the reaction of the LLLPlatform to the ‘Future of Learning’ package.

The European Parliament is responding to these recent initiatives by the European Commission, with the report ‘Modernisation of Education in the EU‘ drafted by MEP Lybacka. EFIL has supported MEP Lybacka in drafting the report.

For more information: elisa.briga@afs.org